Category Archives: Wireless Carriers

Do cell phones cause cancer? According to the Philadelphia-based Third Circuit Court of Appeals, who cares? What matters is that those trusty, politically ambitious bureaucrats at the Federal Communication Commission have the exclusive power to decide the issue.
In Farina v. Nokia, the Third Circuit was faced with a putative class action of all purchasers of wireless devices who were not physically harmed by radio emissions from the devices. (I.e., anyone who isn’t sick). The plaintiffs were seeking an order requiring all cell phone providers to provide hands-free devices with the cell phone to prevent cancers and other personal injury. The Court concluded that allowing the plaintiffs to proceed under various state consumer protection laws would impair the FCC’s ability to regulate wireless carriers. The Court also ruled that “In light of the present state of the science, the FCC has stated that any cell phone legally sold in the United States is a safe phone.” But this flies in the face of groundbreaking research that questions the safety of wireless devices. Cell phones might be safe, or they might not be. And some phones might be safer than others. But the FCC concluding that a cell phone is “safe” is as comforting as the FDA concluding that a drug is “safe.”
The only possible shining light to the opinion is the fact that the court specifically was dealing with people who were not actually sick or injured. Perhaps, just perhaps, the court would reconsider its approach if it were dealing with a plaintiff who was diagnosed with brain cancer and whose cancer was causally linked to his cell phone.
The Legal Intelligencer has the fully story here. The full opinion is here:
Farina v. Nokia: Cell Phone Class Action Preemption

The blog has always wondered how big telecommunications companies get away with charging enormous fees. Wireless communication is essentially a commodity — the wireless service on Verizon is not materially different from the wireless service on AT&T. Normally commodities are perfectly competitive, meaning competitors should and will continue to lower their prices (i.e., compete against each other for customers) until price equals marginal cost — i.e., no profit. This is why most young entrepreneurs aspire to work and invest in finance or information technology companies, rather than become corn farmers or cattle ranchers.
Well at least one federal judge in California has now allowed a lawsuit that asks a similar question to move forward as a class action. Apple’s enormously popular iPhone is locked to work with only the AT&T wireless network. Apple also signed, at least according to published reports, a secret five-year contract with AT&T to be the exclusive wireless carrier for the iPhone. Anyone wanting an iPhone must sign a two-year agreement with AT&T. At the end of the two-year period, iPhone users must sign a new contract with AT&T because of the secret exclusivity agreement between AT&T and Apple. This is as anti-competitive as it gets. Wireless phones and wireless service are two different services and two different industries with different players in the marketplace. Phone manufacturers are not also wireless carriers, and vice versa.
The AP article is here. Questions about wireless carriers or telecommunications companies? Questions about those nasty unidentified fees you seem to always pay rather than contest? Contact Sarelson Law Firm today to discuss.